


don't read the last page (and i will hold on to you)

by akosmia



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Writing & Publishing, Angst with a Happy Ending, Exes, F/M, Getting Back Together, Writers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:20:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28244574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akosmia/pseuds/akosmia
Summary: “Not all the stories have the happy ending we imagine, but it doesn’t mean the process of telling them doesn’t matter,” she says.“Well,” a voice chimes in, breaking  the silence. “That’s sad, though.”It’s a knife to her heart and for a moment she can’t do anything but gasp, because this voice–It reminds her so much ofBen’s.“It is,” she convenes. “Sometimes that’s the only ending we get, though.”-- or: Rey breaks up with Ben and furiously rewrites the ending of her own book. He notices.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 80
Kudos: 281
Collections: Reylo Readers & Writers - The Marvellous Moodboard Event





	don't read the last page (and i will hold on to you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reylocaltrash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reylocaltrash/gifts).



> hi and welcome back to my angst fest! this is the fic that made me take a step back and think, uh maybe i should tone it down with the angst????? so yeah, take this as you will  
> don't worry, it has a happy ending, i promise ♥
> 
> thank you to all the wonderful friends who listened to me while i rambled about this fic and helped me put order into this chaos, i owe you so much ♥ i'm clearly not a journalist or a poet and i'm not even that great of a writer so this is probably my most ambitious work to date but you know what, i'm closing this crazy year with a bang, at this point *shrugs* also, taylor swift has not paid me to be referenced so much in this fic but at this point i should start to think about it. 
> 
> since i probably won't post another fic before christmas, i'll wish you happy holidays now, i love you all ♥

**Rey Niima: no other sadness in the world would do**

_written by Jannah Calrissian_

Despite the fame and fortune her books have granted her, two times Coruscant Times best-selling author Rey Niima still lives in the small apartment she got when she moved to Coruscant and she started working at a nearby coffee shop, fresh off college. 

“I can’t let go of it,” she says, as she welcomes me inside with a smile. “This is the place where I’ve written my first book and where Amilyn ( _Head of Kyberlight Publishing, ndr_ ) has called me to tell me they wanted to publish it. It’s home to me.”

And home it is, indeed. It is a charming little place, full of plants and books and art on the walls I can’t help but be a little fascinated by, as if they could tell me a secret about the captivating woman standing next to me. I even spot a framed autographed copy of a page ripped out of Kylo Ren’s first book, _Defiance_ , framed on top of her writing desk. When I ask her if she’s met the mysterious, anonymous poet who never showed his face in public, she gets suddenly shy and looks away. 

“Just once, briefly,” she replies. There’s a mystery there, in the way she talks. I wish I could coax more out of her, but she seems reticent to talk about it. “He was very kind. He writes beautifully.”

She guides me around until we finally come to sit in her luminous living room. It’s a clear winter day and the light of the sun filters through her flowery curtains, making this place look extremely cozy. There’s no trace of the exasperated minimalism we see so much of on Instagram these days – Rey Niima’s coffee table is littered with books, notebooks and errant scraps of paper. Her sofas are covered in throw pillows. No pattern matches with another. 

“I like to think of my style as distinguishably cluttered,” she says, with a shrug.

She makes me coffee – “I’m sorry, it’s a habit of mine. I can’t talk if I haven’t got a cup of something in front of me,” she tells me, with a lopsided smile – and I get to watch her pour a generous amount of sugar in her mug, then stir it with her spoon with practiced ease. 

**JC:** It’s nice to see you again, Rey. 

**RN:** Thank you, Jannah. It’s nice to see you too. It’s been way too long since we last saw each other. I think it was three years ago? 

**JC:** Yeah, I believe it was. We were talking about _Not Alone_ if I remember correctly. How have you been doing? What have you done in the meantime? 

**RN:** ( _laughs_ ) I’m afraid I can’t give you an exciting answer. My life is pretty boring. I’ve spent most of this time doing laundry, binge-watching TV shows, reading books and writing. Writing above all, obviously, otherwise we wouldn’t be here. 

**JC:** Which brings us to the question. _No Other Shade of Blue_ , your new book, comes out next week. It has been a grueling process for you, I’ve been told. 

**RN:** Yes. It’s been a suspiciously hard book to write, that’s all I can say. I’ve had a few setbacks in these months. 

**JC:** It was supposed to come out earlier this year, wasn’t it? 

**RN:** Yeah. I just had– ( _breathes in_ ) Let’s say I had a lot on my plate at that time and I couldn’t find a way to make this book work. I tried to push myself but it was no use and honestly, I didn’t want to give my fans a half-assed book. So I called Amilyn. She was very kind and told me there was no problem, so we moved up the deadline and here we are now. I can definitely say it helped and I’m very proud of this book and how it came out. I hope my fans will forgive me for the wait! 

**JC:** I’m pretty sure they will. They seem to love you very dearly. Now, _No Other Shade Of Blue_ is a book about soulmates. Where did this idea come from? 

**RN:** Well, I’ve always been fascinated by the idea of having someone out there who is meant for you. Someone who will instinctively fit against the sharp edges of your personality and love you for them, you know? I believe it was a comforting thought when I was a kid. I’ve– ( _takes a deep breath_ ) It is no mystery that I’ve had a difficult childhood. Fans have picked it up pretty early from my books, they’re really clever. ( _laughs_ ) I guess the idea of one day meeting someone who was going to love me unconditionally was a nice thought to fall asleep to, back then. It never went away, I suppose, but over the years it evolved. I started to question how this could even work. That’s how _No Other Shade Of Blue_ was born. 

**JC:** But it’s not so easy, is it? _No Other Shade Of Blue_ is a book about two soulmates chasing each other across time and space and countless lifetimes and having to let each other go everytime. How did this epic tale of star-crossed lovers come to be? 

**RN:** That’s the thing I agonized the most while writing it, which made me push the deadline up. It’s a complicated feeling, the idea that there’s this person who loves you and it’s perfect for you in every way but you’re not just destined to be together. That the person who was meant for you is not the person you’re destined to end up with, that this brings only pain and misery and heartache. And yet you fall back in it everytime, because that’s it for you, no other sadness in the world would do. I think that’s how the book was born.

 **JC:** That’s very deep. 

**RN:** ( _laughs)_ I just let my brain obsess over ideas until they become stories, I guess. 

_(interview continues on the next page)_

✨

Takodana Books is a small, independent bookstore located in one of Coruscant’s new neighborhoods, all trees and nice buildings, with ivy-covered facades that remind Rey of the old movies she used to make Finn sit through during college, much to Finn’s annoyance. The shop itself could pass almost undetected, nestled as it is between a flower shop and a café, and it would be easy to miss, were it not for the simple sign dangling over the door, inviting you in. 

Though she can’t see it from where she’s sitting, in a nook between the stacks, she knows there’s a cardboard poster on the window shop with the cover of her latest book on it (no photos of her, thank God, despite how much Amilyn had insisted) and she knows it reads, **_Today!_ ** _Rey Niima will present her latest book, No Other Shade Of Blue, here at Tokadana Books at 6 PM. Signing session will follow._

Night has already fallen by the time the presentation nears its end. She watches the trembling winter sun disappear behind the tall buildings from the tiny window to her right, bathing the shop in a tentative red haze, before vanishing beneath the horizon. In its place, snow comes to fall in heavy flakes down the busy streets, covering the cobblestones with a layer of white dust. 

It almost gives this tiny world a grainy effect, as if she were watching the scene outside the window shop unfold through a dusty film reel. 

It reminds her of a snowglobe – two figures dancing gracefully among the flakes as the storm rages on. She remembers the familiar weight of Ben’s hand in hers and how his dimples seemed to be more prominent when he smiled so wildly, watching her sway among the snowflakes as they walked hand in hand through the Christmas markets right beside his apartment. The bright lights casted his face in a tender glow, making his eyes look even softer like this. 

She remembers the way this moment seemed to turn into an eternity, suspended into a perfect minute of happiness. 

“We have time for another question,” Maz, the owner of the bookshop – a tiny, old woman who radiates a kind of lively energy that makes Rey feel at ease, despite how nervous she is – says, startling her out of her reverie. 

The old woman casts a glance into her direction, her eyes warm and inquisitive behind her big, round glasses that make her look like a particularly sharp owl. 

“Yes,” she hears herself reply, her voice a tenuous thing. “Yes, that’s alright.”

Maz gives her a smile that looks almost encouraging, as if she could see right through her, beyond the forcefully cheerful attitude she’s learned to put up – as if she could see the beating heart underneath it, battered and bruised as it is, and all the pain and the longing and the pure, simple desperation that it holds. 

Or maybe, she’s just projecting. Her therapist would remind her that she’s got a talent for letting someone else feel her feelings for her, because it’s safer this way. She likes to say that’s why she ended up becoming a writer in the first place, but her therapist rarely rises to the bait and tells her that she needs to allow herself to let these feelings wash over her, instead. 

She doesn’t think she’s particularly good at that. All of her emotions are closed in a secret drawer of her heart, where she can safely keep them bottled up, folded like old clothes she can’t wear anymore. Sometimes her chest feels heavy and tight but it’s way better than letting herself fall to pieces, she supposes. 

“Right,” Maz continues, turning back to the small crowd. “As I was saying, one last question and then there will be a signing session.”

The Christmas lights wrapped all over this small alcove Maz had prepared for the presentation twinkle in her eyesight, when a young woman in the front row tentatively raises her hand. The bookshop is so tiny she doesn’t even need a microphone to be heard by the whole crowd gathered here. 

It makes this look less like a presentation and more like a pleasant conversation, for which Rey’s grateful, because no matter how many times she does this – the awkwardness of growing up alone and never having someone to talk to never quite leaves, as if her childhood were a haunting presence hanging all over her like a shadow, stretched long and thin. 

“Miss Niima,” the young woman starts. “ _No Other Shade of Blue_ is quite different from everything you’ve written. How did it come to be? How did you even come up with that ending? I mean, did you know from the beginning it wasn’t going to get the traditional happy ending all your other books have?”

The bell above the shop door chimes gleefully in the distance, letting out a silvery sound that fills the space for a minute as Rey swallows. Her palms are sweaty, though it shouldn’t be possible given the freezing weather outside, and she rubs them against the fabric of the blue dress Amilyn had picked out for her a few days ago. 

“I think the short answer would be, I’ve always wanted to write a story about star-crossed lovers and I saw this as my chance,” she starts, tentatively, eliciting a small laugh from the public. 

Her heart seems to hammer in her chest, beating a frantic tattoo against her ribcage, and she wonders why no one is pointing that out. Why no one is calling her out on her desperation, her fear, her longing, which must be plain to see, to _hear_ for everyone in this shop. Her heart is just so _loud_ – it seems to scream, in this quiet little store. It roars over the faint buzz of the customers, over the Christmas songs playing at low volume in the background, over the heavy footsteps of someone approaching the small alcove, even over her own words as she fights her way through them. 

It drowns out all the other sounds and all she can think about is this erratic fluttering inside her chest, burning through her like a forest fire. 

“The long answer is– well, I feel like I’ve given this answer before, but– the idea of a soulmate– I think I’ve always been fascinated by it,” she continues, stumbling over her words. She twists her hands in her lap, then thinks about what Amilyn would say about that and lies them flat against her thighs. “There’s just something so _interesting_ in the concept of someone that is just _meant_ for you. But I knew from the beginning _No Other Shade of Blue_ was going to be different from all my other books because I wanted to explore this idea in depth and how sometimes the person who’s meant for you isn’t what you actually _need_. These characters– their story was so complicated and painful and so full of hurt and longing. The ending they got was the only possible ending I could imagine for them.”

– _this is the only possible ending for both of us, we knew that from the start,_ she’d whispered before slamming the door shut, leaving Ben and her heart behind –

“Sometimes,” she continues, swallowing down her heart. “Not all the stories have the happy ending we imagine, but it doesn’t mean the process of telling them doesn’t matter.”

Wouldn’t that be nice, she thinks. 

There’s a moment of silence after her words and she panics, thinks – _this is it. They’ve noticed how desperate I am_ . _They can see right through me, and I’m just a needy, aching creature begging for love._

How mortifying it is, to be caught wanting. 

But then–

“Well,” a voice chimes in, breaking the silence. “That’s sad, though.” 

It’s a knife to her heart and for a moment she can’t do anything but gasp, because this voice–

It reminds her so much of _Ben’s_. 

It’s deep and rumbling, and yet there’s a touch of softness at the edge of it, like velvet wrapped around the sharpness of a sword, like the calm blue sky of the night before the thunder hits. 

She _knows_ , because she’s spent the better part of their relationship memorizing everything about him, as if he were one of his poems and she wanted to learn him by heart. The straight line of his nose, the generous curve of his mouth, the warmth in his laughter, the rumbling of his voice – it all comes back to her, like inexorable waves lapping at the shoreline, erasing all these months’ work of trying to forget him.

But it can’t be. It can’t, really, because she’s left Ben almost a year ago and she’s never looked back after the door slammed shut behind her back. Why would he ever be here, after all this time, when she made it quite clear that she didn’t want him to be in her life? 

Why would she ever get to see him, after everything she’s done? 

Maybe she’s imagining him – maybe he’s a phantom she conjured up for herself by missing him so much, like a ghost pain from an old wound. 

“It is,” she convenes, without looking at the mysterious stranger who sounds so much like Ben. 

She can’t bear it, the possibility. The flutter of her heart in that terrible moment of anticipation, and then the way it will inevitably sink when she’ll realize he’s not Ben, because of course he isn’t, because she’s _left_ him and she’s not _allowed_ to miss him. 

Her gaze stays fixed on her hands, instead, as if fascinated by her own trembling fingers. 

“Sometimes that’s the only ending we get, though,” she adds, almost absent-mindedly. 

She doesn’t know if she’s answering a question or just trying to convince herself. 

“Alright,” Maz intervenes, her voice commanding even when she doesn’t mean to be. It’s remarkable, the amount of authority such a tiny woman is able to convey. Rey would fear her, if she didn’t like her so much already. “I think the time at our disposal has ended. We’ll start the signing session?” she adds, casting a glance into Rey’s direction, as if she’d noticed how antsy and nervous she is. 

Rey nods, grateful. 

The signing session goes smoothly as always. The small crowd gathers in a tidy line and she takes her time with everyone, flashing them a smile and asking them their name, writing a meaningful little message above her signature. It’s a draining process, but she likes it – it feels a bit more authentic to her, at least. 

By the time she reaches the last person in line, the storm outside is in full swing, the wind rattling the windows of the small shop. She signs the last copy of her book and watches the crowd of people slowly dwindle down, the bells above the door tingling as they slip outside the shop one by one. The store is almost empty now, save for a few customers browsing through the shelves, and a melancholic Christmas ballad is playing faintly in the background. 

Her heart feels like a desolate land, as if the storm were raging inside her chest too. 

Then, as she’s gathering her coat and scarf, a floorboard creaks behind her. She turns, expecting to find Maz, already on the cusp of thanking her for everything, but when her gaze falls on the person beside her, she can’t help but jolt, because–

“Hi, Rey,” Ben says, softly. “It’s nice to see you again.” 

✨

**Folksongs and the grief of lost love**

_written by Jannah Calrissian_

Kylo Ren has done it again. 

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the past few years, the name Kylo Ren should ring familiar. It’s been exactly five years since the mysterious author, who never appeared in public, has published _Defiance_ , his first book of poems. It had been a hit from day one – copies sold, a never-ending buzz around it, quotes used as Instagram captions. Everything you can imagine and more. _Defiance_ climbed up the Coruscant Times’ Best-Selling list as if it were no big deal, surpassing big names like Alastair Snoke in the process. It even won the Bespin Poetry Award, the most important award a poet could snatch.

A little editorial miracle, wrapped in barely a hundred pages of poems. 

And then, silence. He disappeared for five years. 

Kylo Ren – whose real name we still don’t know, despite the required digging that has been done in the last five years – has no social media presence, no email address, nothing that could indicate he truly exists outside of the poems he let into the world. He just published his book and vanished from the face of the Earth.

Which is why his second book of poems, _Folksongs_ , has been such a surprise as it hit the shelves. 

The naked, overwhelming intensity of _Defiance_ pales in comparison to the vulnerability shining through the whole of _Folksongs_. There’s something raw in these poems, as if Kylo Ren himself were opening up his ribcage for all of us to see, baring his beating heart to our curious gazes. It’s intimate, as if he were talking right to our ears, and yet it feels as if we were intruding on something not meant for our eyes. As if these poems were a letter we’d found hidden in a drawer.

 _Folksongs_ is a tale of loss in its purest form. It’s sharp and painful and it feels like a knife lodged between our ribs, poking out our hearts. The grief for a lost love is a thread that connects all the poems and it shines through the pages, almost overwhelming in its magnificence. It leaves you wondering who’s the person who’s inspired all these words. There is no better declaration of love than this. Whoever they are, I hope they know.

 _(click here for the rest of the review)_

✨

It’s a sharp sort of pain, seeing him again after so long, more acute and subtle than she’d ever imagined. It’s not a blow to her heart or a punch in her gut – it reminds her more of the sudden flow of blood to a numb limb, slow to the awareness and yet devastating in its sharpness.

For a moment she can’t do anything but stare at him, breathless. 

He looks – God, he looks like the Ben she loves. 

He looks like _home_ , which is such a wild thought. What home is supposed to look like to someone who never took roots anywhere, too scared of seeing them wither before they could blossom into something new? And yet, she remembers thinking about the circle of Ben’s arms – how safe he made her feel when he held her, how she thought she could build a home out of him, before she burned to the ground the timid walls he’s built around her.

And now he’s _here_. 

Warm eyes, soft hair, giant hands wrapped around a bouquet of what looks like lavender. There’s no detail she doesn’t know by heart, aa if he were a song she’d memorized every note of, even if it’s been months ever since they’ve seen each other. He’s shrinking in his shoulders as if he could pass unnoticed like this and it tugs at heartstrings she thought she’d severed right after she’d left his apartment.

Instead, feelings she’d thought long dead flood her heart again, almost _painful_ as they crash over her like a tide. 

There are so many things she could say to him, like _I’m sorry_ and _I miss you_ and _I don’t know how to be alive and not love you_ , but instead, all that comes out of her lips is a tentative, ridiculous, “You’ve got snow in your hair.”

He does. There are fresh flakes between his dark curls, melting at his temples and dampening those soft strands she used to run her fingers through all the time. All that she wants to do is reach out and brush the flakes out his hair herself, taking advantage of this moment to caress his curls again just like she did so long ago.

Instead, she stays put, because he’s not hers to touch anymore and it’s such a terrifying thing, this ache she feels in her chest. It’s needlessly cruel, to know someone and then _not knowing_ them anymore. 

“Oh,” he breathes out. 

He blushes, a familiar flush coming to take hold the sharp features she’s spent hours tracing, and then he runs a hand through his hair, as if to disperse the last few flakes. The tips of his ears, when they peek through his dark strands, are flushed red too. 

It makes her chest feel suddenly tight. 

“Right. I rushed here, so–” he trails off. Then, he awkwardly holds out his arms and hands her the flowers. “Also, these are for you.”

 _He rushed here through the storm_ , she tells herself. _For you_ . _He brought you flowers._

Her hands curve around the flowers tentatively, as if her fingers had stopped working. He inhales, sharply, when her fingertips brush against his and she’s quick to retreat, almost snatching the bouquet from his hand, as if he’d burned her. The scent of lavender fills her lungs for a moment, soothing and familiar at the same time.

“Oh,” she says, surprised. Her cheeks turn red, her breath short on her lips as her heart hammers away. “You remembered–”

“– that’s your favorite flower?” he finishes for her, his eyebrows rising slightly as if a bit insulted. “Of course.”

He says it so _easily_. Of course he _remembers_. As if she were something worth remembering, even when she broke his heart in two. 

She doesn’t think she’s ever been remembered. Not like this, at least – like something precious and dear. 

She tries not to get her hopes up because – because she doesn’t deserve to have hope in the first place. She’d traded _hope_ for the comfort of her old, safe loneliness after all, didn’t she? But it’s so _hard_ , when Ben looks at her like that – with a gaze that feels as warm as a fireplace, brown eyes looking even softer in the gentle glow of the fairy lights. 

She clears her throat and places the flowers on the armchair she was sitting on up until two minutes ago, as if terrified of ruining something so delicate and beautiful as his bouquet. She’s pretty sure there’s a metaphor in that, but she doesn’t have the energy to think about it. 

He would write a way more devastating poem out of it, anyway. 

“What–” she starts, then gulps. There’s a lump in her throat that feels like her own erratic heart, clawing its way out of her ribcage. “What are you doing here?”

The blush on his face deepens, turning his pale skin pink and coming to cover the familiar moles on his face and Rey – God, she feels as if he were prying her ribcage open himself, poking at her bruised heart, because he’s so devastatingly _easy_ to love. Soft gaze, the ghost of a tender smile pulling at his lips, those giant hands of his coming to run through his hair, resting at his nape, twisting nervously. 

It feels as if the universe had conspired to bring him to her, this disarming man that knows how to undo her with just a glance. 

“I–I just wanted to see you. Give you my congratulations for your new book,” he murmurs, his voice low as if it were a confession. “Maz– she’s an old family friend and I come often here. I saw the– the poster–” He points at something behind his back, probably at the poster Rey has seen earlier. “And I thought– I can leave if you want, though. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“ _No_ ,” she replies, immediately. 

It comes out more forcefully than she’d intended it to be and she jolts at the sound of her own voice, as if it had burned her, but the thought of watching him _leave_ –

Well, that’s the point, isn’t it? That’s why she left in the first place. Because she couldn’t stomach the idea of being left. Of being left by _him_. 

Ben looks at her, his eyes so impossibly warm and familiar and _loving_. A sudden thought possesses her and she briefly wonders what would happen if she just held out her hand and brushed her fingers against his, tentatively. 

If he would mind so terribly. 

“No, please, it’s alright,” she adds, hastily. She sinks her nails in her palms, balling her hands up into fist as if to prevent herself from reaching out for him. “It’s–” She clears her throat. “It’s good to see you. You look great.” 

He doesn’t just look great – he looks like something she loves. 

He’s wearing that old, black peacoat of his that she liked so much and a soft-looking red sweater underneath it and he looks so domestic and familiar, as if he’d walked right out of a memory – one in which they were happy, walking through the bright, crowded streets of Coruscant right before Christmas, his gloves on her hands because she forgot to bring hers, his lips pressed to her temple in a tender kiss. 

She’s lived in that memory more than she’d lived in her own life, these past few months. 

A flush spreads on his face again, high on his cheeks, and he shrugs almost dismissively, as if brushing off ill-fitting clothes.

“You can talk,” he says, softly. He does the thing he always did when they were together – he works his jaw and lets his eyes wander all over her frame for a fraction of second, as if to admire her. It still feels as if he were worshiping her, a pilgrim eyeing the statue of his goddess with fear and adoration in the back of his gaze. Then, he smiles again and adds, “I like the blue.” 

Her heart feels like a hummingbird in her chest, fragile and eager and fluttering crazily against her ribcage. It is a tender, foolish thing, this heart of hers – it doesn’t know it wants things it can’t have. 

She wonders if he can hear it. If he can read the desperation right off the lines of her face, as if it were one of his vivid, devastating poems. If he pities her, this ridiculous creature of longing she’s become. 

If, by miracle, he longs for her just as much as she longs for him, even if she doesn’t deserve it.

“Thank you. I think it’s a bit pedantic, but Amilyn insisted.” She shrugs. “She says it’s simple but effective, as marketing strategies go.” 

Ben chuckles, quietly. It’s not the heartfelt laughter that used to burst out of his lips when they were together, rumbling and earth-shattering in its beauty, but it’s a chuckle nevertheless and she’ll take it. It always feels like a privilege, being the one who makes Ben laugh. 

“Does she plan to make you wear blue for the whole press tour?” he asks, his lips curling in a playful smile. 

Rey scrunches up her nose. “Probably.”

Another chuckle that travels straight to her heart, flooding it with a warmth she’d thought she’d lost ever since she walked out of his life. She doesn’t deserve to feel it, this tenderness coming from him, and yet here he is, looking at her with those disarming warm eyes of his, the barest hint of a dimple on his cheek when he flashes her a tentative smile. 

She dies to brush her fingers against it.

“Well. She’s right. It suits you,” he murmurs. His voice is low, almost intimate, and her heart feels on the verge of breaking because she’s missed it, she’s missed _him_ no matter how hard she tried to forget him and he’s standing there and he’s just a few feet away and she _could_ – “It brings out your eyes. I’ve always loved how bright they look when you wear blue.”

This is the moment that seals her fate, she thinks. 

The moment she realizes it’s pointless, to pretend she’s not affected by him. That she doesn’t love him with every fiber of her being. That she doesn’t lay awake at night, wishing she knew how to rewind time and stop herself from walking out of his life that cold January morning.

“Oh,” she breathes out. 

He blushes again, the pink tint high on his cheeks. “Yeah.” 

A silence settles over them for a moment, falling on their words like a soft, warm blanket. It’s not tense or awkward – instead, it feels almost _tender_ , of all things, as if they both could feel the invisible strings between them, tugging at both of their souls, pulling them together.

It’s hard to resist, this pull.

“I–” he starts, then. The fairy lights give his hair a faint shine, and his eyes seem to reflect the glow coming from them. Among the shelves, surrounded by books, he looks like poetry in motion. “I read your book.” 

“Oh.” She inhales, as if he’d just hit her, and then she adds, her words almost slurred together, “You didn’t have to, I mean, it wasn’t–”

He tilts his head and just _looks_ at her and the words die on her lips. There it is again, this unsettling habit of his to just _see_ her. To see right _through_ her, through the layers of lies she’s wrapped herself in these past few months only to glimpse the bruised, aching soul underneath it. She feels naked, exposed.

 _Vulnerable_. 

She’d run, if there was anywhere to run to where she didn’t bring the thought of him with her.

“Nonsense. You know I love everything you write,” he murmurs. His voice is dripping with fondness, and it does something to her, this steadfast affection that pours out of him like honey. She has to blink the tears away. “It was beautiful. But it was so _sad_.”

 _I was so sad,_ she almost says. 

And then, before she has a chance to utter a word, a justification, a lie–

He steps closer to her, their bodies inches away, and asks her, “Rey– why did you change the ending?”

✨

Wrapped in the sheets as they are, it feels almost as if they had shut the world outside. As if they were living in their own private universe, where fate cannot slip through. 

At least for a few hours.

“I don’t want to let you go,” he murmurs, right against the warm skin of her shoulder. 

He drops a kiss there for good measure, as if to make a point. His hand runs up and down the naked skin of her back, as if to memorize the feeling of it underneath his fingertips before it’s too late. 

There’s a tightness in her chest that wasn’t there before. Her hand comes to card through his hair, softly, as if not to ruin this moment, as if not to tear this fragile little paper dream they’ve built for themselves apart with a firmer touch, a heavier hand. 

She has to blink the tears away. 

“I don’t want to let you go either,” she replies. Her voice is shaky, uneven. It feels as if she were baring herself of all the layers she’s put up through countless lifetimes, worlds, universes, when she adds, “I would have let you love me for the rest of our lives.”

He raises his head from where he’d buried it in the crook of her neck. His eyes look like flames in the pinkish light of the dawn, bright and terrifying, as fiery as the sun out there. 

He looks at her like he loves her. 

It frightens her to death. 

“You would have?”

She brings her hand to his face, cradles the side of it. Smoothes the skin there. Her thumb brushes against the scar she’d gifted him, who knows how many lifetimes ago, in a corner of the galaxy she’s not sure it still exists.

“I would have,” she confirms, her lips curved in a sad smile. Her hand slides down, resting against the place where his heart beats, steadily. A sound that she learned to recognize above the chaos and clamor of a spinning universe. Her own heart beats to the same tune, in time with his. “That’s the problem, I suppose.”

( _Excerpt from_ No Other Shade of Blue _, by Rey Niima_ ) 

✨

The words hang in the air for a moment in the small space between them, echoing around the countless shelves and Rey _feels_ the jump her heart does before it stills completely in her chest. 

She feels almost – _electrical_ , as if she’d touched a live wire and she were still reeling from the jolt, a new kind of current coursing through her. She notices her hands are shaking only when his gaze falls on them and she’s quick to hide them in the pockets of her dress. 

It’s pointless now, this desperate attempt to hide any crack in her armor, and yet she’s stubbornly clinging to that semblance of invulnerability that has been her shield her whole life. 

It’s a hard thing to let go of – because, after all, who would she be without it? 

“I– I don’t understand.” She furrows her brows in confusion, as if she didn’t know exactly what he’s talking about. Still, it feels easier than admitting the truth. As if speaking of it could make it real, somehow – the fact that she broke her own heart and destroyed her happy ending in the same breath. “What do you mean?”

Ben sighs, a little defeated sound that seems to be as loud as cannonballs in this small, secluded section of the bookshop, where it’s just the two of them and a history of longing between them. He’s so close she can feel a bit of his warmth, lingering in the space between their bodies and it feels so good to let herself bask in it, just for a moment, just this once before she loses it all again. 

It’s inevitable, this weakness when it comes to Ben. As if he’d unlocked the drawer of her neatly folded feelings, letting them wash all over her like a wave she can’t do anything else but drown in it. That’s what Ben felt like, all the time – like the wave, but also like the lighthouse offering her safe harbor from the storm and she realizes only now, almost a year after their break-up, how the comfort he gave her was stronger than any fear the waves could bring.

But it’s too late, now, isn’t it? 

_Isn’t it?_

“When– When we were together–” he starts, then clears his throat, as if the words had lodged there, between a breath and the other. “When we were together, you told me you were working on a book about two soulmates and that, you know. It had a happy ending. You told me that’s what made the book so interesting for you to write– the fact that this story was about hope.” 

_I couldn’t stomach the idea of a happy ending without you_ , she wants to tell him but the words are stuck in her throat and nothing comes out of her lips. It scares her, the ache she feels in her chest – the way her heart seems to beat so loudly against her ribcage, as if to beg him to notice her, desperate and hungry for the love he poured into every gesture, every look, every smile. 

He made loving her look like it was _natural_. 

How could she ever leave that behind? 

She averts her eyes, terrified of seeing a fondness in the back of his gaze that could undo her. Or maybe not to see it. It’s hard to tell, when it comes to her heart – she doesn’t know what would unravel her the most, if watching Ben look at her with love in his eyes or discovering that love isn’t there anymore. 

“This is the best possible ending I could have written,” she replies, then. Her voice trembles, like the faint last note of a long-forgotten melody, and it sounds almost squeaky, to her mortification. “This is– this is a happy ending of a sort.”

Ben sighs again. 

When she looks at him, he comes in small details – the way his body moves, the way he leans back against a shelf, his dark coat and dark hair a spot of blackness against the warm tones of the shop. The way his gaze seems to linger on her for a minute more, as if reading her. 

“We both know that’s not true,” he murmurs, then. It’s so _soft_ , his voice – a half whispered lullaby that wraps around her like a lover’s embrace. “That’s not a happy ending at all.”

The words lodge like an arrow in her already bruised heart and then the pain makes her flare up – as if he’d sparked a fire within her chest, wild and all-consuming, burning away what’s left of the shattered pieces of her heart. 

It’s the first time she feels something beside a dull ache where her heart once used to be. 

“Well, how can you tell?” she spits out, her voice uneven from the fury. 

She doesn’t know why she’s so mad – why the words come out of her mouth like a bitter tide, full of rage and regret and fire and Ben looks at her with those disarming eyes so full of warmth and, _oh God_ , so full of _love_ she feels the fire in her chest turn into a conflagration that burns her to ashes. 

(Because rage is easier, she thinks. Because if she’s angry she doesn’t have to dwell on the pain. Because she’s been angry the whole time – at herself, for letting him go. At him, for allowing her to ruin this. At her parents, for leaving. At the whole world, for giving her something precious but not the courage to keep it.) 

He tries to reach out for her, his hand lingering in the space between their bodies before falling away with a soft sound. It kills her, this moment of hesitation where once there was only surety. 

“Rey,” he whispers, as if her name was a prayer, an enchantment, a poem, so fervent and adoring. “Rey, I didn’t mean to upset you. I just– I wanted to _understand._ I wanted to know _why._ ”

– _why did she leave, why did she slam the door and cried and cried and cried until her chest ached because of it on her way home and why did she never come back_ – 

The memory only sparks her fury. 

“I already told you! This is a happy ending, you just can’t tell! You’ve never written a novel, you wouldn’t know how to write one in the first place. All you do is write sad poetry and–” _And love me even if I didn’t deserve to be loved_ , _even when I was at my worst and I broke you down_ “– and you don’t know, alright? You just don’t _know_. This is– This is _hopeful._ ” 

He looks at her in disbelief – wide eyes, lips parted, his chest heaving out a breath that feels like a blow. 

“ _Hopeful_?” he repeats the word as if they’d changed the meaning of it while he was asleep and he’s trying his best to make sense of it. He sounds as if it had personally offended him, as if it were a knife driven straight to his heart. “What’s _hopeful_ about having to leave behind your soulmate? Rey, that’s _hopeless_.”

As if she didn’t _know_. 

As if she hadn’t spent the last few months trying to fill the void he left by ignoring its existence, only for it to get bigger, more painful, more _present_. 

“Sometimes that’s the only ending we get, alright?”

Before he can say anything – before he can wreck her again with a single look –, she moves. It feels instinctive to crowd him against the shelf, as if he were pulling her body into his, and he doesn’t move as she stands in front of him, even if he’s way taller than her and could step away so easily. 

Instead, he just watches her as she traps him there, his back pressed against the spines of old books, his chest rising and falling in quick waves. His eyes burning like flames on his face. 

She can’t stand it, how much she loves him. How much she wants to be loved again by him.

“Sometimes we don’t get to believe in happy endings,” she continues, her voice shaky, her breath coming in short pants as her chest goes terribly tight. “Someone has to leave first, there is no other version of this story.”

For a moment everything stills, as if time had stopped.

She can hear the ragged sound of her heavy breath, the rapid beats of her heart, the rush of blood in her ears. Her hands tremble by her side and she can feel the floorboards creaking underneath her feet, the fairy light letting out a dull buzz over them. The sad Christmas ballad plays softly in the background, a barely-there sound. 

Maybe she’s imagining it – but she can hear even the thundering of Ben’s heart, there, in this little space between their bodies. 

And then, Ben reaches out for her. 

It is such a small thing, the pressure of his hand against her cheek, and yet it feels as devastating as a punch. It’s tentative, hesitant – as if he expected her to brush him off, to pull away, to run as fast as she can. 

Instead, she leans into him. 

His palm is warm, his touch almost worshipful. She can hear the small intake of breath that he takes when she rests her cheek against his hand, her eyes fluttering closed for a second as if to feel it. His thumb comes to stroke her skin, brushing against the freckles he used to spend hours mapping. When she musters up the courage to look at him again, his gaze is adoring. 

“Rey,” he murmurs again. He’s said her name so many times she feels almost dizzy from it and she wonders if she’ll ever be able to hear it again without thinking of him. There’s no accusation in his words when he finally asks her, “Why did you leave?”

The words are a blow to an already shattered heart. 

There’s just so much that she can take – and she’s been trying to keep it together for so _long_ and she’s been so _good_ at it, but she’s tired of holding the pieces of her heart in her hands and pretending it’s not broken at all. 

She can’t stop the first, heart-wrenching sob that escapes her lips, and then it’s a waterfall, a wave, a tide rising and pulling her under. It feels like the door she’s slammed on her way out of Ben’s apartment has finally been blown open and now all the feelings she’s tried to outrun explode in a burst of iridescent light, burning through her like a blaze.

She only notices she’s swaying under the weight of it when she feels Ben’s hands on her arms, steadying her – and his touch is so familiar, so comforting, so _easy_ that it only makes her cry harder. 

Ben is so tender about it, his kindness settling like guilt at the pit of her stomach. He wipes the tears away with the back of his hand, gently, and then brushes her hair out of her face, tucking a stray lock behind her ear with all the love one could possibly pour in such a simple, mundane gesture. 

“Ben–” she tries to say, but all the words die on her lips when he looks at her. 

In this light, it almost looks like _love_ , the glimmer in the back of his eyes. 

She can’t dare to hope. She can’t afford to hope. 

But, Christ, she _wants_ to hope.

“Sweetheart,” he says, so softly. The endearment falls from his lips easily, as if no time had passed, as if they were still together, doing Christmas shopping, and he’d called her to catch her attention and show her something. “Sweetheart, why did you leave? I don’t understand.” 

There’s a reserve of strength somewhere in her soul she’s been drawing from ever since she left him – just to keep herself going, just to exist and to function in this world without him by her side. But she finds in this moment that there’s nothing there anymore – that all that she’s left with is her aching heart and bruised soul and a terrible sort of longing that steals the air from her lungs and the words from her lips. 

So she doesn’t fight it anymore. 

Instead, she sinks into him – she crashes against him, like two binary stars finally colliding in a flare of brightness, and rests her head against his chest, her lips inches away from his heart when she murmurs, “Because you were going to leave me.”

✨

You undo me.

It is a privilege

to be pulled apart

by your tender hand.

( _Scavenger_ , from _Folksongs_ , by Kylo Ren)

✨

A second passes, then another.

There’s a familiarity in the way Ben wraps his arms around her frame that feels like a weight pressed against her chest. It seems to her as if their bodies were made for this purpose only, their limbs fitting perfectly against each other, their fingers created only so they could hold each other’s hands. 

Rey can’t help but feel at _home_ there, as if she’d drifted her whole life from place to place like a ghost because she was meant to be there, in this little bookshop, clinging to him after missing him for so long.

It’s so terribly _easy_. 

Ben tenses the moment her words hit. His back straightens, like a drawn bowstring ready to send an arrow flying, and though he doesn’t let her go, his hands come to rest upon her shoulders, pulling her away just slightly, just to look her in the eyes. 

In this light, he looks desperate and shocked at the same time.

“What are you talking about?” he asks, so softly, as if a harsher word could break this spell they’ve created. His breath hitches on his lips, a barely-audible sound that has her in ruins, when he adds, just as softly, “I was the happiest I’ve ever been with you, I was going to– You were the love of my life– How can you say _that_?”

He looks so earnestly sure of it and the worst part is – she knows he is. He’s Ben, after all – so eager and intense and vulnerable at the same time, slipping into her life almost unnoticed between one coffee date and the other, and yet bringing with him the promise of warmth and spring, flowers blooming in her chest whenever he rested his head upon her heart. 

Ben, who showed her his deepest hurts with a trust in the back of his eyes that made her breathless, something sacred that bordered on faith, and she’d never known what it felt to be believed in until he came around and changed everything. Ben, who made her waffles in the morning and kissed her goodnight before falling asleep and held her to his chest whenever she cried and made it look like loving her was the best part of his life. 

How to explain it to him, this dread that she brings with herself everywhere she goes? A fear that turns spring into winter, that freezes the flowers before they can bloom?

This terrible, overwhelming terror of being _loved_. 

But what else can you do, when loves come at the high price of being _vulnerable_? How to explain to him, this creature of hopeless devotion and raw intensity that loves as if the world depended on it, that for her loving meant letting herself get hurt whenever she got left behind?

“Because that’s what always happens. Because that’s how the story always ends for me,” she murmurs, then. She feels so small, so pathetic, so fragile – so fearful and yet so desperate. She’s spent her whole life chasing this kind of love and yet she’s spent her whole life running from it at the same time and how can you even live like this without ripping yourself in two? “You were happy then, but you would have left me _eventually_. People like me– I’m not the kind of person people stay for. I’m not the kind of person who gets a happy ending.”

The only ending she ever gets is this – a bleak winter devoid of every emotion, a frozen ground where nothing can grow. A fade to black just after the saddest scene. There’s no third act for her – just a barren field that reminds her of the desert she’d tried to escape her whole life.

Ben’s eyes are full of tears, his hands trembling, there where they rest on her shoulders. Ben, who always feels so deeply and doesn’t know how to hide it. His shoulders sag, as if deflated, and he looks at her with such a sadness in his gaze.

“You can have a happy ending,” he says, barely above a whisper. His voice is uneven – a small, desperate thing that makes her chest ache again. “Rey, you can be _happy_. You– you _deserve_ to be. Not with me or– I don’t know. But you deserve to be happy.”

A new wave of tears starts to stream down her cheeks almost unnoticed and she only realizes she’s crying when Ben comes to brush them away with his tentative fingers. For such a big man, his hands are so _delicate_ – hands that were made for love and softness and tenderness. Hands she wants to kiss, right now, as she begs for forgiveness, littering his knuckles with kisses of devotion.

“I never thought I could. But I was okay with it, until–” The sob that escapes her lips turns into some sort of hysterical laughter. "Until _you_ came along. And God, Ben, you _ruined_ me. And you were so _sweet_ and _kind_ and you _loved_ me and you made it look like loving me didn’t cost you any effort and I was– I was so fucking _happy_ and I knew that it would _devastate_ me if you ever left, because–" She swallows. Her heart trembles in her chest, before she says, for the first time in her life, “Because I love you.”

It surprises her, how the words that scared her so much fall so easily from her lips now. It still feels so big and overwhelming, this love, and yet what else can she do with this terror and this tenderness but surrender to it? She’s tried to outrun it, but it hasn’t worked. 

Ben inhales, sharply. His eyes widen in surprise and his lips part and yet no sound comes out of his mouth with the exception of a stunned intake. His chest rises, then falls, and she can feel the frantic beat of his heart in the small space between their bodies. It flutters, desperately, just like hers does. 

His hand slides down, resting on the side of her neck as if to bring her closer, when he finally asks her, “You _loved_ me?”

As if it were a surprise – as if she hadn’t loved him from the very first moment, disarming smile and entrancing dimples and those warm eyes of his that called to her like a melody only she could hear. 

Her hands come to rest on his chest, an old instinct she can’t bear to fight right now, and she can feel the way his heart beats erratically underneath her palms, as if it were begging for her to notice it. Ben doesn’t stop her – instead, he brings his free hand to cover both of hers with a familiarity that makes the ache in her chest flare up in another blaze of light.

“I love you. Present tense.” Her lips curve into a tired smile. She feels so naked right now, as she bares her soul for the first time in her life, but Ben’s gaze is so _gentle_. “And I thought that if I left before you could leave me, then I would have had some sort of control over this pain, but I don’t and I hurt you too and–” Her voice falters. “It’s no excuse for the pain I’ve caused you. I’m not asking you for forgiveness. I don’t deserve it anyway. But I love you. And I’m sorry. I wish I could take it back. I wish I could take it all back. I would rather be terrified with you than safe on my own.”

Ben doesn’t reply and she doesn’t expect him to. What would he ever say to that? But he looks at her with those eyes – burning on his face, like a fire that leaves her breathless, and so full of tears.

“I know you don’t feel the same anymore,” she adds, letting her hands fall away. “It’s been a year. You’ve probably moved on and I don’t–” 

Before she can step away from him and let this – _him_ – go, something unexpected happens. 

His fingers come to wrap around her wrists and he brings her hands back against his chest, her palms brushing against the soft fabric of his sweater. He holds them there, as if not allowing her to run away again, and the brush of his thumb against the delicate skin of her wrists turns her fragile heart into chaos.

" _Moved on_?” he repeats, as if insulted by those two words. An incredulous expression spreads on his face, his eyes wide and alight with a mad sort of fervor. “Rey, all the poems I’ve written in the past year, hell, my whole book– it’s all about you,” he says, ardent as ever, devotion pouring out of his lips. “I love you. I don’t know how else to say it, really. I love you.”

Oh, how terrifying it is, to be loved.

There’s so much she could say – like _I’m sorry_ , and _I don’t deserve to be loved the way you love me_ and _I don’t know how you can even look at me and not hate me_ , and yet she doesn’t say any of that, because words seem to mean so little at the moment. A lifetime spent playing with them, putting them one after another and making a living out of them, and yet they fail her now, as she stands in front of Ben with nothing but her heart and her love.

So, instead, she twists her fingers in the fabric of his sweater and brings him down in a kiss.

It’s like coming back home. He feels warm and safe and like this is where she’s meant to be and when he kisses her back – God, he _kisses her back_ because he _loves_ her still – Rey feels as if something had taken root in her heart and flowers were blooming in her chest again, right there in the middle of a freezing winter. He kisses her, long and deep, on hand cupping her face and the other resting at her waist, and warmth starts to spread in her limbs, golden and luminous like a dawn.

She can’t believe she ever let him go.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispers against his lips when she pulls away to breathe. She can taste salt on her mouth and she doesn’t know if she’s crying or he is, but she doesn’t think it matters. Not anymore. “I’m so sorry, I should have never left, I never meant– I was so scared– I love you, I love you–”

Ben cups her face into his hands, his fingers winding into her hair, and rests his forehead against hers. It’s so _intimate_ – the way they seem to melt together. He breathes her in and his eyes flutter closed, but she looks at him the whole time, as if to tell herself that this is real, this is happening. 

That this is her third act, the one she never expected to get.

“Let me give you your happy ending,” he murmurs, then, his voice so soft, so quiet, so gentle. Begging her. This broad man, nestling his body around hers and _begging_ her. “ _Please_.”

It’s the desperation in the last word that undoes her. How could she ever deny him, when he begs her as if he were presenting his heart at her feet and asking her to take a pity on it? 

So she leans in again and kisses him – kisses the pain and the tears away, kisses the months they’ve been apart away, kisses the fear and the dread in her own chest away. Her fingers dig into the fabric of his sweater and for the first time in her life she’s not scared of clinging to something, because Ben clings to her just as fiercely, his lips desperate and fervent against hers, his hands gripping her as if she could disappear into thin air.

It is an earth-shattering thing, to be loved so much. 

“I don’t want to hurt you,” she breathes out between kisses, her heart beating a terrified tattoo against her ribcage. She brings a hand to his face, brushes his hair out of his forehead and cups his cheeks, her thumb counting all the moles on his skin. “Not anymore.”

“You won’t,” he tells her, so _surely_ , as if it didn’t scare him to death, the idea of putting his eager little heart into her hands again. As if knowing she wouldn’t drop it again. “I know you won’t.”

How he can trust her, she has no idea, and yet she wants to be worthy of this faith he puts in her. So she does the brave thing and puts her heart into his hands, too, letting him _see_ her for the first time.

“I’m seeing a therapist,” she confesses, her voice barely audible even in this silent space they’ve found. 

She knows she’s trembling, her hands shaky, the words coming out in a slur from her lips, and yet Ben doesn’t push her away at the first signs of vulnerability. Instead, he brings both of his hands on her shoulders and holds her, his palms rubbing against her arms as if to warm her up.

“That’s good,” he murmurs, softly. “I’m so proud of you. I know how scary it can be.”

The words are like a golden warmth, spreading in her chest. He’s _proud_ of her – no one has ever told that before, she thinks. No matter all that she’s accomplished in her life, she thinks this is the moment that she feels truly _appreciated_ for the first time.

“It’s– terrifying, really,” she says, letting out a watery chuckle. “And– I’m trying. I’m trying to work on all these issues, but it takes time to undo a lifetime of repression and– I don’t want– I can’t– Ben, I don’t want to hurt you again–”

How could she even convey it, this mix of eagerness and fear that seem to cloud her mind? The only thing she wants to do is to lose herself in his embrace, and yet he’s so earnest and vulnerable and the thought of _hurting_ him– 

Ben takes her back to this moment by bringing her palm to his lips and planting a kiss right at the center of it. It’s a small gesture, but he makes it seem intimate, meaningful. Then, before she can say anything, he starts to litter her knuckles with worshipful little kisses, eliciting a quiet laughter from her.

“We can take it slow.” His eyes are so full of hope. Of warmth. Of _home_. “We can work on it together, at your pace. Whatever you want, sweetheart. I just– I want you to know this isn’t the last page of the story,” he murmurs, planting another kiss to the tips of her fingers. “This is just the first one.”

It feels so big, and yet, for the first time, she isn’t scared of a new beginning. She isn’t scared of the first, tentative roots taking place in her heart. They’re fragile and tender and she knows it will take time for them to blossom into something more and she’ll have to be careful about it, tending them with a gentle hand and genuine attention, but for the first time in her life all this effort doesn’t scare her. 

Not when she can share it with Ben.

So she nods, a tentative smile spreading on her lips. “We could start by getting coffee?” she asks him, her voice almost pleading. “And a bagel, maybe? I don’t know about you, but I’m _starving_.”

He leans in and kisses her forehead, so softly – it’s barely a brushing of lips, and yet it brings the promise of more. More kisses, more warmth, more of this gentle happiness in her chest that feels like home. 

“A bagel sounds great,” he replies, quietly. “Lead the way, sweetheart.”

He slips his hand in hers, slowly and yet surely, and she thinks that yes, this is only the first page of a long, long story. 

  
  


✨

**No Other Shade of Blue sequel on the horizon?**

_written_ _by Jannah Calrissian_

It’s been a few months ever since Rey Niima’s latest book, _No Other Shade of Blue_ , has hit the shelves, and the buzz around it hasn’t quite died down yet. The book is about the epic, romantic, desperate tale of two star-crossed lovers who chase each other across lifetimes and planets, until they have to let each other go.

Or do they?

Rumors about a possible sequel for this tragic book have started to circulate in literary circles, drawing the attention of the fans, who have been speculating about it ever since the book came out. 

When asked about it, Rey Niima neither confirms nor denies the rumours about a possible sequel for her tragic book. 

“I don’t know. It could be. Sometimes, some stories just aren’t finished,” she says, when I reach out to her. “Sometimes, the last page is only the first one of another story.”

_(click to read more)_

**Author's Note:**

> as usual, you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/akosmia) and on [tumblr](http://kylorensx.tumblr.com)!!


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